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A classic cake – Mantovana

The Mantovana cake is a classic! Very good for breakfast, it is also a lovely dessert that goes very well with Tuscan Vin Santo. Either way I am sure you’ll love it.

Stella chef at Misenplace has kindly shared this recipe with me last year and I’ve tried immediately. As i really don’t like almonds, I’ve tried to use pine-nuts instead and the result was very good. Decide according to your taste or use both almonds and pine-nuts.

Ingredients

200g sugar (I always use the brown sugar)

150g flour “00”

50g potato flour

100g melted butter

50g of pine-nuts or chopped almonds

5 eggs

16g baking powder

grated lemon rind (half lemon)

Preheat the oven at 180°. Grease/flour a cake tin 25 cm.

Set the yolks and whites apart. Melt the butter in a saucepan

Beat the yolks well with sugar, add flour and potato flour, then add the melted butter, the baking powder and the lemon rind. Continue to stir and mix well.

In another bowl, beat the eggs whites until firm peaks form. Add the whites slowly to the mixture.

Slowly pour in the mixture into the cake tin, add the pine-nuts or chopped almonds on the surface and cook for approximately 40 minutes at 180°.